


Departure

by Tobi83



Category: Xena: Warrior Princess
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-03
Updated: 2013-09-03
Packaged: 2017-12-25 12:56:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/953364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tobi83/pseuds/Tobi83
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gabrielle has taken to talking to herself?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Departure

**Author's Note:**

> No copyright infringement has been intended.
> 
> No Gods or Goddesses were harmed in the making of this work...Xena had already "Been there, done that."

The wooden deck beneath my boots keeps gently rolling, moving with the sea as only a ship can, so far I don’t feel seasick but that could always change…it usually does. This ship’s taking me the Gods only know where…if there are any of them left out there. Maybe it’s only Eli and Eve’s God left now… along with Aphrodite and Ares.

I didn’t really have a destination in mind when I boarded, I just wanted to get away from Nippon, the death and destruction…and the memories.

There’s a most glorious sunset this evening, one of the most beautiful I think I’ve seen in years, but it’s the loneliest too. Me and a jar of ashes traversing the seas, does anyone need a girl with a Chakram?

At least you’re still with me Xena, whatever form that may be, I’ll take it. I’m not ready to travel alone, but then I’m not sure if I ever will be. It’s not as if I was going to wake up one morning saying; “Xena, I think it’s time I stepped out on my own now, it was great travelling with you. So long old friend!”

Never in my wildest nightmares did I think I would be the one to go on alone. At least not after the first couple of years, when I was forever thinking that you’d just leave me behind in some tavern at the next village we came to.

You left me. In such an irrevocable way, how did you think I’d feel? But then you always were rather impetuous and drastic. It’s one of the things I love about you, your damn self-sacrificing attempts at redemption, forgiveness.

Only _you_ have the power to forgive yourself.

Do you remember, years ago, when I’d wake up in the middle of the night, in a panic that you’d left me, that I was all alone in the middle of wherever the hell we were at the time? I’d be wild eyed and sweaty, but you would always reach out and pull me down close to you, holding me tight, telling me that you wouldn’t be leaving me anytime soon if you could help it, in that low rumble you have when you’re still half asleep…

Sorry. Had.

 I can’t get used to that, speaking about you in the past tense, it’s just so wrong.

So…final.

It’s so beautiful here, and all I can think about is the impossibly small pot I’m clutching in a white knuckled grip, for fear I’ll drop it…drop you.

My soul mate and best friend…my home.

Sometimes it seems like all my friends and family leave me, but then I guess that would be the case for anyone who inexplicably spent thirty years in an ice sarcophagus because Ares couldn’t cope with the prospect of your partner’s death and know that you’d never forgive him if I weren’t by your side. Even in death Xena, isn’t that what we always said?

You’ve cheated death so many times, so have I, I suppose. But I never thought that this time would be any different.

There was a way to reverse it and you refused.

You chose to leave me Xena.

I guess everyone leaves eventually. They die, move on or whatever, and they leave people behind, standing on the desk of a ship watching a glorious sunset, that by all accounts they…we ought to be sharing.

How could you?

How could you leave me Xena?

xxxxxx

The sun finally sank beneath the horizon heralding the reappearance of Xena. She stood to the side of Gabrielle, watching silently.

“Did you hear everything?” the blond asked without turning, though she clutched the wooden urn closer to her, knowing implicitly that Xena was now beside her.

“Yes.”

“You know it doesn’t change how much I love you, don’t you? I just had to get it off my chest whilst you weren’t standing right next to me” finally she turned her tear streaked face towards her.

“I know” replied Xena quietly; reaching out to brush some of the tears away “I couldn’t abandon all those souls to oblivion Gabrielle? How could I justify being so selfish? Could you, really? I know what you said to me, but would you really have been able to live with yourself?”

Gabrielle shook her head and stepped closer to the spirit of the dark haired warrior to be folded within long arms in a comforting, familiar embrace.

“I haven’t really left you” continued Xena after a moment “In body perhaps, but never in soul. You are mine and I am yours, just as it always should be and forever will be. This isn’t going to change the depth of my love for you either” she finished, eliciting a chuckle from the blond and a puzzled frown from the warrior “What?”

“You sap!”

“Humph…well, I like that” muttered Xena in a playful tone “tell a girl how much you love her, and look what it gets you.”

After a pause Gabrielle spoke again “I love you too Xena, body and soul.”

The pause lengthened before finally Xena added “Well, now who’s the sap?” causing them both to chuckle.

“Seriously Gabrielle, though it may seem like I’m gone, even in death I will never leave you” she let the sentence hang between them before speaking once more “So, now what?” she asked with interest.

“I’ll keep travelling, go where I am needed. Find Eve and tell her what you’ve got yourself into this time” she added with a good natured nudge to the warrior’s ribs.

“Sounds good to me…Eve’s going to be pissed though.” mused the warrior quietly, as the final sunlight vanished.

“Oh yeah” came the drawled response through the darkness “very.”


End file.
